Mr. Speaker, I would like to inform you that I will be sharing my time with my colleague, the hon. member for Rimouski—Mitis.
On February 24, the first budget of this Liberal government's second mandate was delivered to Canada and Quebec. Not surprisingly, the maple leaf theme was omnipresent. The Liberals' masquerade is over. The true face of the Liberal government, the Prime Minister and his finance minister has been revealed to the people of Canada and Quebec.
What the Bloc Quebecois had been dreading since the Speech from the Throne, that is, an unprecedented invasion of provincial jurisdictions, has now become a sad reality.
In Quebec and the other Canadian provinces, the finance minister's words had a bitter flavour. The provinces have realized that, once again, they will have to pay a high price for the Liberal government's visibility, while the federal government completely ignores their demands to restore the transfer payments the Liberals have been systematically cutting back since they were re-elected in the fall of 1993.
What can we say about the government's position on the employment insurance issue? Where is its commitment to agriculture? The budget does not contain a single line on this industry which is vitally important to Quebec and my region in particular. Not to mention the war of flags that will be fought on the backs of Quebec students.
These remarks accurately reflect the comments made by the stakeholders in my riding of Lotbinière. On Tuesday, these people met in my Laurier-Station office and, after seeing the finance minister's fiscal plan, they concluded this was “a Canadian Liberal budget devised by a centralizing government that is gradually squeezing the provinces”.
Let me quote some of the comments made by socio-economic stakeholders in my riding: “Why does the federal government want to create a fund that will directly compete with Quebec's student loans and grants program?” “Where are the job creation initiatives?” “What will the Minister of Finance do with the employment insurance surpluses?” “Not a word on agriculture; it sure tells you what the federal government thinks of this sector.” “Independent workers are not just concerned about their dental plans; it is not enough, it is a joke.”
Let us take a look at the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation. Once again, we can see, upon reading the budget, that the Minister of Finance is contradicting himself.
In his speech he said “Education is a matter of provincial jurisdiction. It is the provinces that are responsible for the curriculum, for educational institutions, for quality”. But the minister's respect for provinces, for Quebec, stops there. How the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation will operate will be defined without consulting the provinces.
The minister was clear on this. He said “Once established, the Foundation will consult”. The foundation, which will be administered through a cumbersome, costly and complex structure, will make life difficult for Quebec students.
The federal government, along with certain provinces, is doing the groundwork for the establishment of a true federal education department. This government, which cares so much about the Canadian Constitution, which is even prepared to go before the Supreme Court, cannot even respect its own Constitution.
This government, which is looking more and more unitary, is acting unilaterally. In actual fact, this budget is the second phase of the Canadian flag operation, a Plan B attempt to charm young people, a strictly election-minded strategy.
The Minister of Finance's budget ignores the provinces, who wanted the Liberal government to be fair, and to use its surpluses to give them back what it cut in transfer payments. But the government takes no notice of what the provinces are up against.
I would now like to share another reaction from one of my constituents: “I would like to see the look on the faces of those waiting in hospital corridors when they hear that the federal government is not returning one red cent to the health sector”.
By refusing to give back to the provinces the billions of dollars it has taken from them in recent years, the federal government is giving a signal that health is not a budget priority. Although the Minister of Finance used the phrase “equality of opportunity” in his budget, it is a budget full of financial inequities.
Let us now look at EI, specifically at surpluses in the EI fund which, at the rate things are going, will stand at $30 billion by the year 2000. That is the finance minister's big cash cow for paying down his deficit. Employers and unions throughout Canada called for substantial reductions in EI premium rates.
On Tuesday, workers were shocked to hear the Minister of Finance boast that the unemployment rate had gone from 11.2% in 1993 to under 9% in 1997. These victims of the new system were excluded from EI because of restrictive eligibility rules.
In conclusion, the scenario for Quebeckers, for our young people, for our sick people, for our seniors, as written by the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance, with the help of the Minister of Human Resources Development, is a sting aimed at our entire society.
I would like to inform you that, unlike the multiple Oscar-winning 1970s Hollywood movie “The Sting”, the Canadian version of that movie currently running in the federal parliamentary theatre is not winning any awards, with the exception of an Oscar for best predator to the Prime Minister and best imposter to the Minister of Finance.